spoken word – Cajun Mutt Press

Cajun Mutt Press Featured Writer 05/03/23

May 3, 2023 James D. Casey IV

The Quiet Savior

Each dog sees another’s asshole as hors d’oeuvre.
The marking of stop signs is not a show of status
nor defense of territory. It is a menu of the night before.
A dog doesn’t care what you think. It wants
to know what you ate. What have you brought him
today as he hides in a culvert? Let’s say you are there
just to make a rescue video. Trust is finally gained,
but something else is lost. It wafts away and gathers
in the creases of the void. It is pushed through the ring
of flesh. It is the quiet savior come to tell the tale of a meal.

These Conditions

I was born in a hospital. Did anybody come? No. I had to
fight my way out. There was nothing to hold on to. My grip
was fluid. A feeling of excitement grabbed me, yet made me uncertain.
Suddenly I found my voice and yelled, “God damn this place.
God damn this place.” People rushed in to soothe me,
but it was too late. Things got more serious after that.
I discovered there were many more thrown into these
same conditions. I was taught an absurd little tale
in school about what I should do with my penis, for the good
of the human race. So here I am trying to fuck you, man.

Fecal Phobia

It’s the expectation I resent. They insist I follow to scoop up
their lawn mines, like I was born and bred to handle shit.
But if I’m being honest, I most certainly was. They’ve got
that right. I don’t have any fecal phobia. It rides in my
pocket around the block encased in its Tupperware crypt.
It’s a burial at sea when we get home. One flush and away
they go. Sometimes I forget my pooperware and flashlight
when we go out at night. Duty tells me to blindly grope and fling it
in a bush, but civility presses me to leave it for the morning beat.
I hunt and hunt. Nothing. Some other dog has eaten it all up.

Pissant

Crawl, crawl, crawl up the slope of the toilet bowl, ant.
Then may you drown in white urine.
This is the way the male of this species takes to battle.
We are not very good at sending out scouts.
Nor do we swarm some gummy sludge on the ground.
We stand guard with words breathing the secret
of fire. We command the showers to spread
the faith. Believe me, you nest dwellers.
There is no more room in this house for castaways.
You settle or meet your maker going down the pipes.

Tim Kahl [http://www.timkahl.com] [https://soundcloud.com/tnklbnny] is the author of Possessing Yourself (CW Books, 2009), The Century of Travel (CW Books, 2012) The String of Islands (Dink, 2015) Omnishambles (Bald Trickster, 2019) and California Sijo (Bald Trickster, 2022). His work has been published in many journals in the U.S and abroad. He is also an editor of Clade Song [http://www.cladesong.com]. He is events coordinator of The Sacramento Poetry Alliance. He builds flutes, plays them and plays guitars, ukuleles, charangos and cavaquinhos and touches on many other instruments from around the world. He currently teaches at California State University, Sacramento, where he sings lieder while walking on campus between classes.

Coming Soon from Cajun Mutt Press, LEPER MOSH by David Alec Knight

September 13, 2022 James D. Casey IV

LEPER MOSH by David Alec Knight drops one week from today, on September 20th!!! This collection is an ode to youth, music, and horror movies. Peppered with poems that read like album cover descriptions, song lyrics, and memories. Hear him read Growing With Metal Parts 1 – 5 in this video.

“David Alec Knight’s ‘Leper Mosh‘ is an amalgamation of beauty and darkness. From waxing nostalgic about a youth of heavy metal, horror films, and comics to turning mirrors into windows of a woman’s soul, this book hits with full-throttle force. Even at its more bittersweet or softer moments, there is an underlying edge that runs the gamut of this book. With lines like: “Outside, distant sirens prowl. We reach for the first dark and our desires make light,” Knight’s repertoire of emotive language makes ‘Leper Mosh‘ a poignant read and a definite keeper. Any fan of poetry will love this book.”
—Heath Brougher, editor-in-chief of Concrete Mist Press

“The secret Knight is letting the reader in on… Well you already know, but you hide from it, you ignore it, you bury it. But, there is no getting past Knight’s willingness to dive into the morose, the malaise and the madness of life. This collection of poems is filled with gems and insight, and an unflinching look at a life unfurled.”
—Rob Azevado (Don’t Order The Calamari, Turning on The Wasp)

𝘓𝘌𝘗𝘌𝘙 𝘔𝘖𝘚𝘏 by David Alec Knight drops one week from today, on September 20th!!! This collection is an ode to youth, music, and horror movies. Hear him read Growing With Metal Parts 1 – 5 in this video.

Author Bio:

While in high school in Chatham, Ontario, David Alec Knight and his parents were told by a teacher there that he would be lucky to finish high school, and certainly wouldn’t make it through university. One of David’s English teachers, Bernard Cameron, saw something in his poems though and encouraged him to pursue his writing. He also attended workshops led by the poet, Ted Plantos, when he was writer-in-residence at the Chatham library.

David ended the ’90s studying Creative Writing at the University of Windsor (B.A. Hon.). While there, his poems appeared in Wayzegoose, People’s Poetry Letter, and Canadian Writers Journal. Anthology appearances include, The Sandwich Mill Anthology (1997), $10.00 Cash Value: An Anthology of Assets (2000), Ellipsis… (2008), By The Wishing Tree (2021), Poets For Ukraine – Volume 1 (2022), Muse (2022),and Love Lies Bleeding (2022). Recent poems have appeared in Verse Afire, Cajun Mutt Press and The Lothlorien Poetry Journal.

David’s work journeys honestly through darkness before there is any light, so it is well earned and substantial when there is reprieve. He speaks with his own voice, but he acknowledges as inspiration and influence, Edgar Lee Masters, Carl Sandburg, Gregory Corso, Charles Bukowski, Irving Layton, Ted Plantos, E. J. Pratt, and Paul-Marie Lapointe. Margaret Atwood’s Journals of Susanna Moodie and Irving Layton’s A Wild And Peculiar Joy are most reread in his library.

Since graduating from St. Clair College in 2014/15, David has worked in healthcare as a Personal Support Worker. In 2021, he was recipient of The Ted Plantos memorial Award for Poetry. The Heart Is A Hollow Organ, David’s first book, soon followed.
Leper Mosh is David’s second collection of poems.

Cajun Mutt Press Featured Writer 05/18/20

May 18, 2020May 19, 2020 James D. Casey IV

AIRPORT

She met me at JFK airport as promised.
Dirty rock-salt-snow clung to her ’70s mountain boots.
I mean the real shit-brown, throwback, faux suede with green laces and aluminum eyelets, ’70s
mountain boots.
Christ, does she still own a CPO jacket?
Or desert boots from Thom McAn?
I got rid of my Buster Browns and peacoat when I was eleven.
I’ve heard they’re back in style now.
Everything that goes around comes around.
I’ve heard that too.

“Let’s have a drink,” she says. “I’ve always wanted to drink in an airport bar, haven’t you?”
“I have, too many times.”
She doesn’t believe me.
I remind her I don’t drink anymore, because when I did I
ended up snorting the dirty rock-salt-snow that now clings to her boots.
“Oh, come on, one can’t hurt, I’ve always wanted to drink in an airport bar.”
So she did.
And I did.
I awoke in some hovel south of Brownsville, Texas, and never saw her again.

William Teets is an author and poet born in Peekskill, New York, who has recently relocated to Waterford, Michigan. He immensely misses New York pizza, the Hudson River, and his beloved Mets. He will write. He will survive. Mr. Teets’ works have been published in Chronogram, The Deadly Writers Patrol, Cajun Mutt Press, Art and Life, as well as in numerous anthologies. He has also published a novel, Reverend Went Walking, and a memoir, Upside Down (One on the House).